By Louie Stout

Hudson Lake bluegill

A biological survey of Indiana’s Hudson Lake turned up a healthy fish population – especially for panfish.

Hudson Lake is located in northeastern LaPorte County. The 435-acre lake has two basins and a DNR boat ramp was constructed there in the northern most backwaters basin in 2019. (Read more about the opening here.)

District Fisheries Biologist Tom Bacula’s crew was there a year ago in May for a quick look at the bass population and retuned in late June to survey the entire fish community.

“We were there to evaluate the lake since we’ve added the new boat ramp,” said Bacula. “We also wanted to evaluate the plant life and see how much the invasive starry stonewort (plant) has increased.”

The good news is that the exotic plant hasn’t spread as much it has in some lakes. Starry Stonewort grows in patches so thick that fish struggle to get through it. It’s one of the toughest non-native plants to kill.

Overall, said Bacula, the fish community looks good and continues to offer excellent panfishing. His netting efforts turned up 18 different fish species including bluegill up to 10.3 inches, redear up to 9 inches, perch up to 11 ½ inches, a few crappie and nice pike. Hudson historically has had a good pike population.

The spring bass survey didn’t turn up the numbers he expected, but Bacula said their electro-fishing boat is only effective down to about 6 feet and the water was very clear. Also, the equipment isn’t as effective for stunning bass that are in deeper, heavier vegetation. Electro-fishing probes daze fish temporarily to allow biologists to net them and take measurements before returning them safely back to the lake.

“We were there during the prespawn and the water was so clear the bass could see us coming and spook away from the boat, so I’m not too concerned about the numbers,” he said. “But we did see some decent fish up to 20 inches. We did find quite a few that were less than 12 inches which is an indication the lake has had a couple good spawns. I also think the bigger fish were using cover deeper than what we couldn’t reach with our electric probes.”

He also turned up eight smallmouth bass, but all were 9 inches and under.

“The lake has the habitat to support smallmouth and we’ve turned up a few in previous surveys there,” he added.